I went to a local fair and they had an exhibit featuring Star Trek- it had props, costumes, scripts, sets the whole 9 yards everything you could want to see and more!

Now I am more of a Star Wars guy but I do love me some good Star Trek too! Lately, Amy and I have been working our way through the Star Trek movies (Thank you Netflix!). I started to think about what benefits/skills the Captains would bring to youth ministry:

Captain James T. KirkGO with the feeling inside- While Kirk went with his gut reaction, we have the Holy Spirit to guide us, and if we were smart we’d listen to it.

Keep a diverse team- Spock, McCoy, Uhura, Scott and Sulu. This is a team that is made up of people with different strengths and weaknesses. In ministry we often try to do everything on our own, but the fact is we all have weaknesses. We need to find people to work with who can fit within our weak spots and we need to let them shine.

Keep learning- If there was anything Kirk did really well, is he learned from others so he could adapt and be flexible. We need to do this in ministry to keep fresh, otherwise we become stale and less effective.

Captain Jean Luc PicardHave your priorities in order- Picard always put his crew or the people he was helping before himself. He also made sure to always complete his prime directive of every mission. There is an order of who we need to take care of: Our families and ourselves then others- if we don’t take care of ourselves we will be useless to work with anyone else.

Ask for help- One thing Picard did well was ask for help. When he knew he was beat he would get help. We need to do the same thing in ministry. Sometimes we need to get ideas from other people, sometimes we just need help getting a task done. No matter what you need help with, make sure you ask.

What are some leadership lessons you have learned?

Kyle Corbinhas been serving youth as a volunteer or pastor for over 10 years. He is currently the youth pastor at the Bridge Church in North Vancouver B.C. You can follow his blog at: kylecorbin.blogspot.com or Twitter: @CorbinKyle